Holden elementary school on lockdown after disturbed woman enters

Wednesday

Dec 19, 2012 at 3:00 PMDec 19, 2012 at 9:57 PM

By Melissa McKeon CORRESPONDENT

A woman entered Dawson Elementary School on Salisbury Street Wednesday morning waving a piece of paper with the words “Sandy Hook” and references to the number of people killed at a Conn. elementary school last week, sending the Holden school into a lockdown, according to Holden police.

The woman managed to enter the school, which is equipped with a buzz-in security system, as parents and families were leaving a winter concert.

Dawson Principal Patricia Scales said staff reacted appropriately to the woman, who went straight to the school office next to the front door. Staff redirected her outside the school and called police.

Holden Police Chief George R. Sherrill said police treated the incident as a medical call. The 55-year-old Holden woman was taken by ambulance to UMass Memorial Medical Center. Chief Sherrill said he did not believe the woman was armed.

Chief Sherrill said the woman had written down four things in barely legible scrawl on pieces of paper: “Sandy Hook,” “Elementary,” “20 children” and “6 adults.” Twenty children and 6 adults were shot dead by a gunman at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., last Friday. He said when police interviewed her, she talked about the killings in Connecticut.

Ms. Scales praised staff and police for responding quickly and appropriately to the incident. She said police were at the school within three minutes.

The school went into lockdown mode in response to the incident, which means students, staff and anyone else in the building were confined to rooms until the building has been inspected by staff and police.

Some families still in the building for the holiday concert were confined to the gymnasium for about 20 minutes, she said.

Ms. Scales said she did not believe the children had been disturbed by the lockdown, which resembled drills they conduct each year to prepare for such incidents.

But since Friday's shootings Connecticut, the staff is on high alert.

“Everybody's hyper-vigilant right now,” she said.

Chief Sherrill said the department has no history with the woman, whose name he did not release.